Our primary goal is to help neurodiverse people feel heard, welcome and valued in the open source community. We also want to help neurotypical people better understand and support neurodivergent perspectives. As this session will be co-run by a diverse group of professional researchers, citizen scientists, and coders, we will model participatory practices, and demonstrate the value of working collaboratively and equitably. We want to share how we have managed this project to be inclusive and empowering, and lessons learnt from creating an open-source project designed by, and for, autistic people. This includes sharing strategies for effective community management, and design ideas/principles for creating a safe and accessible online space, which maintains privacy and agency while being committed to open research. We are excited to learn and grow by engaging with the ideas, knowledge, and experiences of the MozFest community.

Creating neurodiverse wellbeing is core to the AutSPACEs project and at the heart of our community. We are dedicated to improving the wellbeing of autistic people, and this is reflected in multiple dimensions of the project: empowering autistic people throughout the research process; creating an online space which is designed to be inclusive and accessible to individuals across the autistic constellation, and working towards research outputs which have a positive impact according to autistic people’s priorities. We welcome MozFest’s dedicated space to neurodiversity. It is hugely exciting to have the opportunity to be part of a wider conversation about neurodiverse wellbeing, and to engage with a community hoping to change online norms to support neurodiverse people. The MozFest values of openness and collaboration, along with a shared desire to improve the wellbeing of neurodiverse people, makes this an ideal space for our session.

We will structure the session so that 5 members from our community (~6 minutes each) present a piece they’ve developed for the project. We plan to have 3 targeted discussion sections where participants engage. If there are low numbers of attendance, we can hold everyone in the same online space and support a discussion with the whole group. If a larger number of participants attend, we will structure “breakout groups” and have our community members supporting the discussion. We will support accessibility for a neurodiverse group by 1) a “calm room” on Zoom where anyone can go at any time for a break from the session; 2) “type” and “talk” contribution options (with a notetaker) 3) supporting the session with a code of conduct designed to facilitate inclusive, respectful interaction. The AutSPACEs team has extensive experience facilitating neurodiverse groups, and we will tailor our support for individuals as needed.

We’d be delighted to continue dialogue from the session and offer support/onboarding for those interested in joining our community or using any of our resources and techniques. We are excited and open to opportunities for future collaboration. We will (with participants’ permission) take notes on an open document, which we will publish on our GitHub repository, so that the learning is openly available, can be shared with the AutSPACEs community, and can be incorporated into future research. The co-design of the AutSPACEs platform is ongoing, with many opportunities for collaboration throughout the research cycle. AutSPACEs is open to all, and attendees will be warmly invited to join further discussions via. a range of routes, including regular, public meet-up sessions, and our Slack channel. We are also able to support others in neurodiverse inclusion.